DESCRIPTION: In this application, we aim to establish an in vitro model to recapitulate early heart development for safety assessment of specific drugs commonly administrated during pregnancy. In aim 1, we will test our hypothesis that cardiac tissue morphogenesis can be modeled in vitro by micro patterning and differentiation of human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs). We will establish and optimize our in vitro early developing heart model by obtaining a full spectrum of 3D cardiac micro tissues generated from hiPSC patterns with different geometries. In aim 2, we will validate our model by the drugs listed in pregnancy risk categories A and X as negative and positive controls, so we will be able to predict the drug toxicity from categories B-D on early heart development.